Super Slippery!

[This is an example of the kind of joke I often come up with when paling around with my daughter. She turns 5 today.]

The first snow of the season fluttered down to Denver yesterday. Walking hand in hand to my car she noticed that the ground had become, "super slippery."

"Hey Dakota, what would you name a restaurant that serves soup and octopus?"

"What daddy?"

"Soup Or Slippery!"

Doris

[Many of my students ask me if it is possible to make a living playing jazz. Many grown adults from the civilian sector (non-musicians) ask me the same question. Because a simple "yes" from me doesn't often do the trick - all they see is my old car and a rakish grin - I offer the following.]

Friday the 13th, October, 2006

Today I produced and engineered a record for a wonderful jazz piano player. She is making a solo piano CD for her adult students to play along to. It is a collection of traditional children's songs that begins simply and builds in harmonic complexity towards the last song - a beautiful original that she wrote that morning before she left her house. The recording session went smoothly: she knew her material, was comfortable in the studio, and nailed it like a pro.

During the playback, sitting next to each other at the console, I began to learn about this extraordinary woman. She has been playing jazz piano professionally since the age of 14. She is now 74. She put her husband through college and raised her three sons by teaching from her home during the day and leaving to play piano in the clubs at night. When her husband completed his degree he left and was never heard from again until she got word five years ago that he had died.

As her boys grew up they taught their mother to defend herself with Karate. I asked if any of them were now musicians. "None of them. I never understood why they didn't take to music. It wasn't until a few years ago that they told me they were afraid that they would never be as good as I was."

She ended up marrying two more times before choosing to remain single 25 years ago. "I got tired of raising boys - you know - the kind that see a woman bringing home the money and want a free ride.

"This life of music makes me very happy. I can't imagine it any other way. It wasn't easy... its hard for a woman in this business: men with their groping hands... But I made it, and now I have three wonderful grown boys who always look after me. And I play gigs when I want to and I have some really talented students. I am very happy."

If it weren't my job that day to roll tape, listen, edit, and make a CD, I would've been asking a lot more questions and taking notes.
Simply sitting next to a person like this is an extraordinarily calming and enlightening experience. We shared so much in common - a life of jazz music - that we would often finish each others sentence, sometimes by just exchanging glances and a smile. She entered the studio that day a stranger to me and when she left I was saying goodbye to an old friend. Take care Doris!

Your Outgoing Message Is Too Long!

[So is this. But it's a blog...]

We all know what do after the beep. We all know who you're living with and we all know who we can leave messages for. We don't need to hear it EVERY-SINGLE-TIME-WE-CALL-YOUR-PHONE! Please, make your outgoing message clear and succinct and lose the redundancy.

(How many of you have a sign above your toilet that reads Please Flush? Is there a sign on your car that reads Open Door, Climb In, Close Door? Didn't think so. We all know what to do.)

Don't worry about being unique - your uniqueness comes across in the tone and character of your vocal delivery. In this case it is not about length. Short is better. Just make it count! If you absolutely can not shorten it (hint: try simply stating your name.) then please leave the numeric code needed to bypass your phone message at the very beginning of your message.

Have any of you become aggravated at the sound of your friend, lover, client, or business partner's voice after hearing it say the same thing god-only-knows-how-many-times? And you really want to leave a message and you really want to be nice and you really just get frustrated and hold the phone away from your ear and wait till you hear the faint, yet piercing, little beep.

Now your stuck trying to regain your composure and your trying to regroup and focus on what it was you needed to tell them and you're telling yourself you are not going to lay into them for their frustratingly redundant message that actually ends up wasting a large chunk of your life's time!

[Waste time? Sure does. Do the math: Take 1 person you call 3 times a week. Outgoing messages are typically any where from 4 to 8 seconds. Let's just call it 5 seconds and see what happens: (I stopped calling people with songs on their outgoing messages - 10+ seconds long - years ago.)

3(calls/wk) x 5(seconds) = 15 seconds/week.

15(sec) x 4(weeks)= 1 minute/month.

1(min/month) x 12(months) = 12 minutes/ year.

12 minutes a year spent spent waiting for the beep!

Big deal? Go sit in a corner and listen to your favorite outgoing message looped over and over for 12 minutes straight and then tell me it's no big deal. (For those of you still paying for a per minute cell phone plan you may want to consider billing people with long outgoing messages.)

And that's just one person. I am sure you all call at least 2 other people a week with 5 second outgoing messages. Now you're up to 36 minutes a year. Know that you have the formula down just keep on multiplying. Have fun! Share the formula with your loved ones...

And for those of you "creative types" who just can't resist having a song play in the background as an intro to your personal commercial: Change the music every week, at least, and state the numeric code necessary to bypass it. I don't know about you, but I turn my music down to make a call, not up.

Feel you need to leave an alternate # that you "can be reached at"? Don't - unless you ALWAYS answer it. If you answer calls and check messages on the number you gave me I should have no need to leave the same message else where, which is what will happen when you don't answer the other number that you "can be reached at." Make it easy for me to leave a message otherwise I'll stop leaving them.

Please don't even get me started on people who call and leave a message saying, "Hi it's me! Give me a call! Bye."

Wanna Get Married?

[click on link in title to hear soothing music to read by, ahhhhhhh...]

Wanna Get Married?

Being married is like suiting up in armor every morning to joust all day with a fierce and clever opponent who does not play fair.


My wife was tickled by what a cute couple our 80 year old neighbors made. When she had the opportunity to speak to the wife alone she asked, "What's the secret to your marriage?" The kindly old woman replied, "Honey, it's 90% bad and 10% good. Ya learn to enjoy the 10% when ya get it."


The only person who offered me advice on being married was my great Uncle Al. After the wedding ceremony, and as people were eating cake, Uncle Al pulled me aside and dropped one of his huge paws on my shoulder. He looked me square in the eyes and said, " Now Ben, I'm only gonna tell you one bit of advice about be being married, okay? Now I only been married for 54 years but it's worked for me. Ben, there'll be times when ya gotta admit to your wife that you're wrong. Even when you know you are right, ya admit you're wrong. Do you understand that? Okay then. Good luck Ben."

My advice: Say "yes" a lot and watch your back.

Back By "Pop" ular Demand (Strange But Yummy(SM))

Please goto the link embedded in the title of this post and play the song it takes you to loudly as you read and contemplate the following... ready? okherewego -

Due to the flood of emails I have received prodding me for more of my creative-concoction recipies I have decided to provide my loyal readers with a steady diet of Strange But Yummy(SM)!!!!

Tonights treat goes well with a bottle of beer and a movie:

Curry Popcorn!

Heat oil and add mustard seeds Add curry powder [If you do not have an Indian auntie who makes her own curry powder you'll have either to buy a premix or, google curry and figure out how to make it!!] {PS GUYS: women are, like, way impressed when they check you out in the check-out with 10 tiny bags of colorful spices and seeds- you be da man!!} toss those popcorn seeds into the mix and........................................... 40934rjjejildfkjxns rti≈®∂†çƒ√ow;iehnsdfiuvhweoa903euri:POP-A-WAY! 98sduvj4phsp9dihcn¥©˙¨ˆ©†ƒ®∑姮†¥˙¬øˆ
(Add salt and pepper to taste)


-later in the hood!

Third Time's A Charm

They say things happen in threes. [Whoever came up with "they say" probably invented politics...] [and i guess that means someone really messed up when they designed our nose, eyes, ears, hands, feet ,heart, lungs, brain, and ass cheeks: those are ones, twos and fives - no threes. The only threes I can come up with are the three joints on each of our eight fingers! ] And besides, why would one stop counting at three? Why isn't the first of the next set of three really the fourth of the first set of three really the fifth of the next set... ? What do they say about that?

Try finding threes in everything around you - they're there all right, you may just have to be imaginative to see them. I stayed up for three days and now I am really tired. My car broke down, and I had to take a bus back home, and I lost money on the deal - hey it really is true!!! Three things happened, and I know three more things will happen... I got home, ate dinner and then got tired!! OK, that proves it... Our bodies are just messed up and we really should have three brains.

1) A studio owner I know gets barraged on a weekly basis with requests from young engineers seeking employment. He says, "The Y-Generation walk around with signs on their heads that read,'I don't know much, I cost a lot, hire me!' I won't."

2) "Desperation has a way of befriending humility." Ben Makinen

3) What member of royalty said, "Music is my mistress"?

we love you madly!!

-the neighborhood

I look like this. Click here for what I sound like.

A Radio Interview - Tips

On-Air Radio Interview - KGNU 88.5 FM with host Bill Nyreges

[Thanks to modern technology you don't have to blast off into space and try to catch this broadcast as it speeds past Pluto, just link to it!]

http://www.benmakinen.com/music-42.html


Yesterday morning (Oct 9 2006) on-air host Bill Nyerges of FM community radio station KGNU 88.5 interviewed me on his Morning Sound Alternative show. The interview came together quickly through the use of the internet, and with a bit of luck and preparation. Bill had heard a few cds of mine earlier and said he liked them all, but each one fit different programs. We exchanged a flurry of emails that concluded with, "Come by the studio, bring the CDs for the MD to check out, and I may be able to get you on the air."

What follows contains some lessons on preparing for a radio interview.

As I drove to the studio in Boulder (and while getting lost despite having MapQuested it) I had his program tuned in. I was listening to the overall vibe of his broadcast so that if asked I could select a track from my material to best fit into his playlist.

I began running through my mind the replies to possible questions: My influences, current projects, how I got started. (I failed to anticipate, "What are some great stories from the road?")

When I pulled into the parking lot I got all my materials together (CDs, press releases, pens, promo photos, and business cards) and quickly re-read my press release on one of my older CDs to refresh my self on the back-story. I had my laptop with me and pulled up my CD's track listings and song lengths.

Evan, the engineer, took me into the studio, and I shook hands with the host. Bill suddenly turned to Evan, "We just lost the playlist." The station's playlist computer just went off line. Bill turns to me, "You got something short to play?"

I hand him my Lost Lullaby CD. As he loads it into the CD player I crack open my laptop and scan the time lengths.

"Track five, two minutes, thirteen." He punches in track 5, and the tune, Right On Track, starts just as the last song ends.

Bill lets out a breath, "Whew... Oh, that's one of my favorites. What else ya got on there?"

"Short, medium, or long?"

"Medium."

"Track number one, three fourteen."

I had bought them 5 and a half minutes of time for the engineer to get the computer back on line. I also had 2 of my songs played and got the on-air interview!

I was prepared when luck struck. The rest of the interview went smoothly - I scrambled to think of a good story from the road, and thought of some better ones when the mics were off, but when I was asked what my upcoming dates were I simply glanced down at my laptop and rattled off 4 or 5 upcoming shows with ease.

Be prepared, keep your cool, speak slowly, listen carefully, entertain your audience, and thank your host, on air, when the interview concludes.

Quote Of The Day

A music store owner speaking to his salesmen behind the counter.

"Calculator. Where's a calculator? Hey guys, where's the calculator? How can you make a deal if you don't have a calculator?!"

Old Beef Jerky

Got some old jerky that's too tough to chew? Before you toss it to your dog try this:

Place bite size pieces (use scissors if you must) into a bowl of steaming ramen,
cover for 2 minutes,
then take a bite,
close your eyes,
and find yourself in ramen heaven!

Bumper Sticker Of The Week

"Those who vote decide NOTHING, those who count the votes decide EVERYTHING."

-Joseph Stalin

Dream Of The Ingloonka

[I dreamt this not long ago.]

My wife, daughter and I are driving around town doing errends. I've got a coupon for a burrito restaurant, but I've got to locate the outlet that will accept the coupon. My wife and daughter go down the streeet to shop while I enter a cafe/bookstore to figure out the directions.

I'm sitting on a long bench facing a wall of books when a man to my right turns to me and says,"Have you heard of the Ingloonka?"

I knew I had heard of the instrument, but didn't know anything about it, so I said, "Yes."

"Well then you know how a reed interupts the flow of air to create a quarter tone waiver...", and he began to sing an example.

He sang a traditional song from some impoverished asian countryside and I was transported to that place and I watched and listened to a 10 year old girl sing a simple song to her god asking forgiveness.

As she sang I began to feel heartbroken by her earnest plea. The song described her day filled with chores done for the family. Only at the end of this sad song do we find out what she wanted forgiveness for: She had been carrying a bucket of water, tripped, spilled some, and fell on an ant killing it.

She felt so bad about the ant that she was begging God for forgiveness.
When the song ended everyone in the cafe, including myself, felt sadness and foolishness for the insensitivity with which we conduct our lives...

At that moment I met the guy sitting next to the singer and he was Giovanni Hidalgo [one of the world's greatest living conga players] and he was expressing a desire to improve his musical skills and his friend told him, "Man, you know how slow you learn!"

How To Blow Your Tip

Scrunch up your face in disgust when you hear the customer's order and make a grossed-out sound.

Tonight I went in to a college bar and ordered an onion pizza to go.

Waitress: "Eeeeeuuuwww! Really? Okay."

Did I tip? Of course I tipped - she had a great set of personalities.

On Women

A friend of mine is a forty-one year old divorced physicist and he says,

"Women are more complicated than photons...

With a photon you know it is either going to be a particle or a wave. You've got a 50/50 chance of knowing what it is going to be.

With a woman, your odds of knowing what she is going to be are more like one in a haystack."

Quote Of The Day

Young woman overheard in coffee shop:

"Bush was elected on my 17th birthday and then he did it again and he ruined my 21st birthday."